Newsletter July 2017

Waves of Democracy – Berlin, scheduled for May 18 – 23, 2018

The tentative dates of WoD 2018 have been settled, in collaboration with the European Academy in Berlin and our project managers – Ifor Molenhuis, Andreas Guidi and Christin Knüpfer. An informal meeting was recently held in Berlin between IUC´s director Nina Nørgaard and Andrea Despot/Weronika Priesmeyer-Tkocz from the EAB on 7th of July, where an agreement about cooperation was decided upon. This meeting will be followed up in Berlin on September 18, where the draft program, etc. will be presented and discussed.

Our previous experiences managing the summer academies have been fruitful and instructive , and will influence our deliberations with regards to setting the agenda and fleshing out a final programme. A draft has already been circulated among our partners for discussion and further development, and will have elements like:

presentations of good experiences/practices from youth projects

participants´ gallery

inputs from key people in politics and culture

study visits and interaction with the city

workshops on how to develop agendas for young people to debate/talk/be part of Europe/scenarios for a future Europe

cultural/political manifestos to be produced and presented in Berlin/Brussels

Advanced use of social media/blogs/creation of website

Will you volunteer your services to help this endeavour advance to its next step? We are looking for a talented web designer who can create and maintain a functional and attractive website for Waves of Democracy 2018. To express your interest, fill out the ‘Contact Us’ form on our homepage.

Immigration Committee – Copenhagen, June 14 – 16, 2017

We opened the summer season, hosting the EUNET Immigration Committee’s first seminar in Copenhagen from the 14th to the 16th of June.

Participants from Germany, Greece, Czech Republic, Sweden and Denmark took part. Sylvia Baptista represented IUC on the Committee. The results of the meeting will be presented during EUNET’s next General Assembly in Budapest, on October 19th to 22nd.

Model European Parliament – Riga, October 3 – 8, 2017

The MEP Baltic Sea Region Program is a non-partisan leadership program for youth in Estonia, Denmark, Iceland, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Norway, Russia and Sweden. The aim of the MEP Baltic Sea Region program is to develop interest and skills in addressing high level international issues jointly among high-school students in the 11 countries around the Baltic Sea/in the North. The program is a training ground for future leaders and politicians.

IUC’s Nina Nørgaard serves in the capacity of administrative coordinator for the MEP BSR conferences. Our next session will be held in Riga, on 3 – 8 October. Follow the latest developments on the MEP BSR website.

Youth on the Move/Sønderborg 2018 The Model European Parliament in Sønderborg was a great success – Opening Ceremony in the castle, professional committee work, sightseeing in beautiful weather, performance in the new culture house/library, parliament in Alsion and much more – students and teachers had a very good time, staying with host families and in…

Waves 2018 – What’s next? IUC wishes you a happy Easter – and spring time – and promises bustling agendas as always. Waves 2018 has kept us busy with a load of responsibilities and issues to sort through. An important milestone has been reached with regards to the Erasmus + application, in the end we…

Waves of Democracy 2018 – Next Steps An academy that has garnered heaps of praise and is considered IUC’s signature piece on a mosaic of national and international long-term youth projects in the fields of teaching/learning, non-formal (political) education, citizenship and integration, has moved past the initiation stage and we are now working on turning…

Rome Meeting 2017, EUNET On the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the Treaties of Rome, our partner organisation, EUNET, held its 2017 spring meeting in the Italian capital, where Ifor Molenhuis represented IUC. The question of how do we tackle the challenges of Euroscepticism and Nationalism in our educational work, and what role EUNET…

Off to an auspicious start We have had quite a charged up first month of 2017 – reflecting, considering and generating new ideas that will set the tone for our project work for the year ahead. Of course, we would prioritise projects that are already underway and rest on established foundations, though we have dabbled with the idea…

“Teamwork makes the dreamwork” The 45th session of Model European Parliament, held in Copenhagen from the 29th of October to the 5th of November, is a testament to the latter. We saw the coming together of bright young minds from 30 countries across Europe and beyond to discuss some pressing issues which appear on the…

A project over which we laboured long and hard is about to take shape in concrete form and we are delighted to report that we have resumed work on MEP Copenhagen. MEP Copenhagen: October 29 – November 5 Staff of IUC-Europe has been proud to actively involve itself in the lengthy preparations of Model…

Summing up the merry month of May, we present you with our findings from Youth on the Move and IUC’s work on MEP Copenhagen, which is months away from completion but well under way. 6th of May We kicked the month off splendidly by hosting our long awaited seminar – Youth on the Move.…

This month’s briefing will address IUC’s upcoming seminar, Youth on the Move, in further detail by lifting the curtain on what is currently taking place behind closed doors. For this purpose, we have Ifor Molenhuis - a key figure in the planning and execution of the seminar - sit with us and discuss the preparatory…

How do we tackle the challenges of Migration, Euroscepticism and Nationalism in the educational work we are engaged in? That question would be driving the agenda of a seminar, hosted by our partner organisation – EUNET, which is to take place from the 9th to the 11th of March in Vienna.

In the second instalment of our monthly briefings, we will introduce the reader to two other characters, who stood behind the successful planning, execution, monitoring and closure of Waves of Democracy, namely Andreas Guidi and Christin Knüpfer.

The following section is where I am supposed to broadcast my message and share my experiences.For the sake of simplicity, I will do my best to keep it short and sweet with a touch of personality. I hope that you find our monthly briefing interesting and useful.